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Samuel de Champlain was a French explorer and cartographer best known for establishing and governing the settlements of New France and the city of Quebec.

French explorer Samuel de Champlain was born in 1574 in Brouage, France. He began exploring North America in 1603, establishing the city of Quebec in the northern colony of New France, and mapping the Atlantic coast and the Great Lakes, before settling into an administrative role as the de facto governor of New France in 1620. He died on December 25, 1635, in Quebec.

Samuel de Champlain was born in 1574 (according to his baptismal certificate, which was discovered in 2012), in Brouage, a small port town in the province of Saintonge, on the western coast of France. Although Champlain wrote extensively of his voyages and later life, little is known of his childhood. He was likely born a Protestant, but converted to Catholicism as a young adult.

Champlain returned to Quebec in 1604 on Pierre de Mont’s expedition. For the next three years, Champlain explored much of the coast of Nova Scotia, the Bay of Fundy and the coasts of Maine, Rhode Island and Massachusetts.